


Reaching for Peace of Mind

by ilyena_sylph, Merfilly



Series: For Family [8]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Thrawn Trilogy - Timothy Zahn, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Complicated Relationships, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-06
Updated: 2016-07-06
Packaged: 2018-07-21 18:51:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7399501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilyena_sylph/pseuds/ilyena_sylph, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Leia has Winter, and then her father, to sort out what Vader has told her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reaching for Peace of Mind

Winter looked up as Leia returned; she'd been gone quite some time, yet Lady Tano was in the common area, and only one of the Noghri was missing. That had told Winter Leia was in the Tower, but that was not exactly reassuring as time ticked by.

"Are you alright?" Winter asked quickly, rising and going to her foster-sister and friend.

Leia shook her head slightly, reaching for Winter's hand even as she kept moving. The Noghri did not insist, here, on being within the bedroom with her -- and Eriskand was gathering them up with quick hisses in their language. She decided she didn't want to know what they were saying, and just kept moving, firmly shutting the door behind them before she went to sit down on the bed and dropped her head into her hands. With only Winter here, Winter settling in at her side and wrapping an arm around her side, she could let go of her control of her reactions to the incredible, impossible news. 

Winter shifted to actually sit behind Leia and start working along the back and shoulder muscles with precision. "You are as wound as a piece of tungsten wire coil…" she fretted. "What did he do?!"

"Shh -- shh-shh," Leia replied, leaning back into her dearest friend's hands, "it's not that, it's -- it's -- he... he answered me, and I almost wish I hadn't asked!" 

"Oh." Winter kept working, growing quiet to give Leia time to process. From that reaction, and what Winter had begun to suspect… this was going to be an ugly day.

Leia kept herself pressed into Winter's hands, accepting the strength of the massage, the worried care she could feel in the gaze on her shoulders, and she took a few slow breaths. "I'm so confused, Winter, and I don't _want_ to have any sympathy for him, I don't want to _care_ \-- well, no, I want to care about my birth-mother, but..."

"He is your biological father, then? Everything was beginning to add up to that answer," Winter said. "I'd hoped I was wrong, Leia. Truly. But… your birth-mother? Who?"

Leia turned her head, dropping one hand to stare at Winter for a moment. She'd been fairly blindsided by the revelation, but Winter wasn't surprised at all. Just... sympathetic, and understanding. She didn't want to focus on Vader, so she only nodded once, sharply, and went on to the question she actually wanted to answer. "...a Senator of the Old Republic. A woman named Padmé Naberrie, from Naboo. Or at least, I'm assuming that was her name before she married, from what he said..." 

"It gives me something to begin searching, at least. And explains the connection with Sabé," Winter told her. "She was a handmaiden on Naboo, remember."

"And my birth mother was the Queen she served," Leia replied. "Queen 'for two terms', before she became a Senator. So yes. It certainly does explain _that_ , finally!" 

"Termed rule? Intriguing." Winter would look into Naboo, and all she could find as soon as Leia was settled. "Now that he has answered your questions, you can ask more of Lady Tano, and Bail," she pointed out. "They've only been holding back out of… caution."

"I know," Leia agreed, turning back around and sprawling out to let Winter work on more of her back, pillowing her forehead on one forearm. "And I plan to. He... he loved her, Winter. If I'm sure of anything from that entire conversation, it's that the man he was before loved my mother." 

Winter moved to sit over Leia's hips, leaning up to get the lightly scented lotion fro the bed-table. "Shirt," she said, getting her friend to get that out of the way so she could do a proper job of the massage. "And that, at least, is both good, and a strong cautionary tale, I think. If he could become what he did despite love, that is."

"Not despite," Leia disagreed, shifting to pull off her top and settle back down so that Winter could work on her. "Almost... because of. I don't... I need to talk to Ahsoka, to understand... but Winter. Winter, inside that suit is whatever's left of Anakin Skywalker." 

Winter drew in a deep breath. That name was a legend, despite so much of history being erased. "I am sure she will make time for you to talk to her," she said before applying herself to working out the durasteel in Leia's muscles.

Leia nodded, taking a shaking breath. "Somehow... the Emperor convinced him that he was responsible for our deaths -- mine, and my mother's -- when all he had wanted was to keep us safe." 

"So he decided to destroy half the galaxy in vengeance?" Winter asked neutrally. "Oh that was wrong of me. I do not have all the data… but there is a reason he was more feared than the Emperor."

"No, that's about what I said," Leia replied with a quiet noise, half-shrugging into her hands. "Hopefully Ahsoka can make sense of all this, because it makes none to me." 

"You are very much Bail and Breha's child, Leia," Winter told her friend, just to reassure her on that note. "Breeding is not nearly as important as environment."

++++

Bail came to the Tower infrequently without having been invited, but he was summoned to Alderaan now. This visit would allow him to keep Vader in the know about his movements, something Bail had decided was important. The Noghri did not bar him, and he went first to Vader's levels.

Of course, just as he entered, his comm buzzed and was pierced with an astromech's binary questioning.

"An hour at most," he answered the request for when the personal ship should be ready for his flight to the _Tantive IV_ in orbit, his eyes shooting an apology to Vader. The astromech chirped acknowledgment and signed off, leaving Bail to sigh.

"I am sorry. The R5 unit assigned to my personal ship prefers to have an itinerary. I came because Queen Breha has requested I return, to work out more details of Alderaan's missions to those worlds in recovery from Imperial excesses," he told the imposing man. He had missed his wife dreadfully, but framing it around business, which was true, would be easier on this survivor of an intense love.

"You must do as your Queen requires," Vader answered, his head turning to look at Organa, even as that binary warble flickered at the edges of his memory, digging against things that had been buried for two decades. He had not let himself think of what else he had lost in Kenobi's betrayal, had not permitted himself to wonder -- had not wished the reminders of Skywalker's weaknesses -- but that sound, once so familiar... 

"Organa. Where are -- " /the droids, my droids, my friends/, "-- R2-D2 and C-3PO?" 

That was not a happy voice at all, and Bail wondered at why the droids were so important. Yet, it was a question he could answer easily. "They are assigned to Captain Antilles on Alderaan's flagship, Lord Vader. He has a good reputation with droids, and they have served there ever since… we lost _her_."

Organa made no attempt to dissemble, answered quickly... and that... was suitable enough. Threepio hated space travel, but he was competent at it, had even become an acceptable co-pilot for Padmé, and Artoo belonged in space. And on the flagship, they would have been in some small contact with Leia. 

Yes, that had been a suitable choice. "Good," Vader replied, shifting in a small nod, the apprehension that had swept through him washing away again at the confirmation that the gifts to and from the women of his life had survived and were safe. "However, they are Leia's. See to it." 

"As you wish, Lord Vader." Bail gave a small nod to the other man. "I wished to know if there were any orders I should be aware of, as I help Breha plan the relief efforts? Or if I need to do anything further here, before I rejoin her."

Asking Antilles to transfer the droids down to Leia would take little time, and Bail could even see benefit in her having Threepio at her side.

"Nothing for Alderaan," Vader replied, studying Organa for a moment, "but you should go down and see Leia, as you are going to be leaving." 

"I had intended to," Bail agreed. He then bowed before he left Vader, still amazed to find that working with the monster… wasn't as hard as he had feared it would be.

He was allowed all the way down to Leia's quarters with no issue from the Noghri; they seemed more at ease with him today than ever before, and that left him… curious. "Leia?" he called as he entered her apartment, not seeing anyone in the common room just yet.

Her voice came from the bedroom, not the comm suite -- surprising, given the hour -- on a relieved call of 'Father!' that never stopped warming his heart. 

Oh, thank the saints, he was here. Leia rolled to her feet, calling "Just a moment, I'll be right out!" as she yanked her shirt back on over her head, flicked her fingers over the braids to smooth them out, and went out to wrap him in a tight embrace. Winter did not follow, giving them privacy.

No matter who her biological parents were, _this_ man was her father. "Oh, I'm so glad to see you." 

"And I you," Bail said, leaning into that powerful hug, giving her one in return. His eyes closed as he did, before he guided her to the couch so they could sit together. "Are you actually resting today?" he asked, a little bit of teasing in his voice for her not being busy at work.

"I suppose that's one word for it?" Leia replied, leaning into her father's arm once they were settled. "Lord Vader and I spoke this morning. I -- did you always know he -- he was -- " 

Bail felt a frisson of alarm, but Vader had seemed calm. He looked down at his daughter, wary and curious in one. "Know what, Leia?" he asked softly. Was this why the droids had become an issue?

"That he was my birth father," Leia managed to say, forcing her voice to be even as she looked into his eyes, watching as a trace of alarm showed there. 

Bail breathed out slowly. "I held a suspicion it was possible," he told her. "But refused to believe my _friend_ could have instituted the slaughter of those children!" His reaction to the Temple, this many years later, still rang through him as one of the worst atrocities he'd seen or heard of. "That he could have attacked my dear friend Amidala was beyond the realm of possibility, as he had been her ardent protector for as long as I'd known them both."

Leia felt a bitter cold slide through her, her father's agony and fury so obvious in her ears, and she asked, faintly, "The slaughter of those _children_?" 

Bail took a deep breath, eyes closing. "I saw the smoke coming from the Temple. I went to see if I could aid them… and the troopers tried to turn me away, to keep me from seeing. One youngling, probably an Initiate, given his age, almost made it to me before being cut down." His shoulders heaved with pain at the memory. "He was likely the last of the children left alive by that point."

"Father," Leia said, softly, sliding her hand up to lay her fingers against his jaw as she shook her head, "I don't understand what you mean. You've never spoken about those days, not to me. What Temple?" 

Bail shook his head. "I know. I did not ever speak of it. Because talking of the Jedi only invited trouble, and we were worried enough that you would show your abilities where they would be witnessed." He gave her a sad smile. "All of the Jedi on Coruscant, or nearly all of them, died in a single night. Most in the galaxy died about then as well, with only a few escaping for any length of time. Because … they had finally realized Palpatine was the enemy." 

He had to breathe several times to control his emotions enough to speak. "If they had only come to us, before they went to arrest him, the Senate would have been able to countermand some of the damage, impeach him from power, something! Instead, we were told the Jedi had turned traitor, and they were to be executed."

"My abilities?" Leia blinked at him, cocking her head, unsure if she was enjoying having her father so rattled that he was letting information out at every turn or was only concerned at something that _could_ rattle him so much. Her father was hurting, angry even now over something that had to have happened before she was born. 

'All of the Jedi on Coruscant'... had they been based here, then? "All of the official history says that, but you don't agree at all..." 

"I understand Lord Vader still hates them," Bail said in response to that. "But yes, they were here, in their main Temple. I saw them risk everything, over and again, for the Republic, and especially for their troopers. Which made the betrayal, the Purge, an execution carried out by the clones troopers, all that more tragic. These were beings who had served together through so much, turned against one another in some event that makes no sense from the outside."

Leia listened, her chest aching at that thought, at the idea of such a complete betrayal, and shook her head a little. She had noticed that her father hadn't answered the question about her abilities in any way, and firmly decided not to push. 

"He said something about not 'hiding' behind the 'haze of influence' the Emperor had on him," she told her father, thoughtful, considering. "That he was having trouble with his memories." 

"Ahsoka has mentioned that he's been … trying to work through the events since just before your birth," Bail told her. He then ran a hand over her hair. "I know you have been wary, at times, of Ahsoka. But the only other person who possibly could be more invested in finding _Anakin Skywalker_ was your birth-mother," he assured her. "Ahsoka was Anakin's Padawan… a student Jedi. So bear with her, when she is trying to reason with him, or encourage you to listen."

...his student? Anakin Skywalker's student, and a friend? "So she... wants to... bring him back to himself?" 

She couldn't imagine the weight of that, of knowing that someone you had respected had become.. well, _Darth Vader_... and as for being wary of Ahsoka, had her father not seen what she could _do_ , despite having been in that fight? 

No. No, he had seen it. He just was familiar with it already, unlike her. 

"I wish I could stay longer, Leia, help you work through this, but your mother asked me to come home," Bail told her, using his errand as a way to break her from dwelling on revelations. "I'll be sending a pair of droids down, though. You may have seen them aboard the _Tantive IV_ , an astromech and protocol droid?"

"They're such an odd pair," Leia agreed after a moment, "that yes, I remember them. Why are you sending them to me? Don't they belong to Captain Antilles?

"And I almost wish I was going with you. I'd like to see Mother -- but I'm needed here. So you'll just have to hug her for me." 

"I will do that. And I am sending them because the droids were Padmé Amidala's… and Anakin's. The astromech served on the front lines. The protocol droid was often at her side, and very useful. I've never met a droid that has quite that mastery of language.

"Lord Vader would prefer you have them now, and my cousin was only ever holding them in trust." He gave his daughter a small squeeze. "It is a small thing to keep peace with our unlikely ally, yes?"

Leia blinked, shaking her head a little, as she stared at him, her eyes widening. "They were... my birth-mother's? And... his? 

"But he doesn't want them?" Why was that? Why would he not want them himself? 

Bail stroked her hair again, trying to soothe her. "I'm not certain he is comfortable with the familiar things of his original life, Leia. You, he can learn anew. Those droids? Well, they served through hard times with them both."

"Aah," Leia nodded slowly, as that started to make sense. She'd felt the tension between him and Ahsoka like it was a physical thing, while he and her father had been circumspect adversaries for the last twenty years, working together wasn't actually going that badly for them. And droids could be... difficult. "All right. I'll take care of them." 

"I know you will, little princess," he said, smiling at her. "When I come back, we'll talk more about everything you learned today, alright?" he promised her, knowing he needed to get moving shortly.

"Of course, Father," Leia agreed, letting go of him. "And I'm not little anymore." 

"Yes you are," he teased.


End file.
